THIS I like

We're going to have a final exam party in Intro to Teaching! The way my professor put it, "The final will be really easy, and you'll know what's on it, and it's pretty much a restatement of what we already answered in class. There will be Christmas music playing, and food..."
I thought the matching exam promised in Geography would be nice. This is even better. Maybe it's even better than the final that I didn't have to take last semester.

And it speeds up...

Happy (late) Thanksgiving.

We've reached the home stretch of the year. And yet, the home stretch is crazy enough.

• About a month left to get our individual scenes ready for performing, and we need to be off-book (not need the scripts) by Wednesday
• Auditioning at fife-and-drum for the Senior Corps
• Holiday prep
• Final papers, exams, projects, etc.
• The Christian Club panel (one week to go)
• Packing my older brother, getting him ready to go to Basic

A few things I noticed about the things my older brother's first weekend with the Guard. He told us that the army uses the buddy system. So nice to know that the things taught in Girl Scouts when I was about nine still apply. Then there were the things that we were told about how they attempt to create a group. They have many techniques, such as making them responsible for each other. (One person left his manual inside by accident, and my brother's whole platoon was disciplined for not telling him to bring it.)
The main thing, I noticed, was the focus. The focus was on building the group as a group, with little or no focus on individuals as individuals. Even though I know that there is pretty much no similarity here and that the comparison is ridiculous, I couldn't help thinking of the group-forming techniques of Compass, where we were encouraged to share, not to leave anyone behind, etc. We cared about each other for each other, not merely as members of the same group. However, this is implausible and pointless to do with the army. The members are highly transferrable, etc. and they need to be shown that they have to have responsibility for each other regardless of who it is, not just out of decency and the like, but out of necessity. They're building a specialized team, not a family.
The other thing that caught my attention, simply for its irrelevence and yet its unexpectedness, is that the army food is really good, and that candy sometimes winds up in the box lunches.

The Proceedings of the Court

Yesterday at theater we worked on the huge court scene in The Merchant of Venice. This is one of the most famous/infamous scenes in Shakespearean literature. We had a lot of fun with it, of course. Who should be on the stage? Pretty much everyone. What should we be doing? Siding with Antonio, for everyone but Antonio and Shylock. I enjoyed looking concerned, scared, upset, fascinated, and wickedly gleeful while watching my younger brother (Antonio) and his best friend (Shylock) perform.

Then the casts switched, and I was still on stage. Just not as a named character. The Shylock and Antonio were different, and while all are good actors, there is something the young man playing Shylock did better. When everything has just been taken from him, he manages to convey the look on his face that everything has, indeed, been taken away. And the rest of us all have to look on evilly and have no pity for him. Of course, all feelings of "This character stinks" vanished when I glanced at the door through which the young man departed. Through the window he was making funny faces at us, trying to make us laugh on stage. But I have to keep telling myself DON'T TAKE THIS SERIOUSLY! How do career method actors live?

There's one question I have about this scene. It's been established that Antonio is a jerk and that we only like him because he's rich and he only likes us because we're nobles. So if Antonio is totally broke, why on earth are we still on his side? Antonio has no value to us anymore. Are we just for him because we're against poor Shylock? Truly? I understand why, as the director tells us, we're more darkly fascinated (Oh my gosh, will Shylock actually kill him? Oooooo, he's raising the knife -) than grieved and upset. We're glad Shylock loses, probably, more than we are glad Antonio lives.

There are no good characters in this play. Even Portia is prejudiced, and my youngest brother's character, Gratiano (he's perfect for this totally off-the-wall character) is the biggest jerk ever. Even his friend Bassanio says, "Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in Venice." (Somewhere in Act One Scene One.) There are no good characters. But there are fun characters, and that's what will keep us happy with this play. Hey, aren't good characters boring anyway?

A Question of Identity

Human beings are big on categorizing. What would you call yourself? What would you define yourself? And I don't mean the high school extreme (you must be one of the geeks, one of the jocks, one of the cheerleaders, etc.). You could have several dozen different identifying labels. Are you an artist? How about an athlete? A "politics junkie?" (My geography professor calls himself that.) There are classic titles for different types of beliefs and identities. Are you a Jew or an atheist? A Democrat or a Republican? Each of the labels we choose to stick on ourselves build up, and up, and up, so that we are in a large way made up of the choices we make and the interests we pursue.
One of the things we discussed yesterday at the Christian Club meeting was "What are you?" We had visitors from the Secular Club, to try and sort out who we are, what is our purpose in having this event, what to discuss, etc. We went around the circle (there was quite a large group from the Secular Club) and introduced myself. "Hello, my name is Jane/John Doe, I have been going to Anonymous College for __ semesters, and I am a _______." They asked for our denominations, but it turned out to be "If Applicable," because one of us is trying to decide to switch from Catholicism to Protestantism, our adviser is nondenominational, etc. They identified themselves mostly as "Agnostic Atheists" while one was an "Agnostic Atheist Antitheist." (He said the latter term means he totally disagrees with religion, thinks the world would be a better place without it, that sort of thing.)
It was kind of interesting, because I do not agree with a lot of my church's theology. It's Calvinist/Reformed, and I...am not, in many ways. I have no trouble getting along with people with certain levels of different doctrine, as long as Jesus Christ is the focus, so I also would be nondenominational. The labels were really hard to get at, though.
We have a date for our panel: December the 6th. One of the advisers is going to coach the three of us who are on the panel, and my church's youth pastor was awesome and emailed me all the powerpoints used for the youth apologetics class this semester. YouTube debate videos, C.S. Lewis books (and one by Francis Collins), and more are being used as our materials to get ready for this event. The most important thing, though, is that God be with us and help us to do well.

Operation Christmas Child

Operation Christmas Child is a ministry run by Samaritan's Purse, an organization headed by Franklin Graham, and its mission is to send gifts to children in devastated, third-world or poverty-stricken communities across the world. The way it works (at least at my church) is that people donate things like toys, toiletries, candy, school supplies, etc. and other people (this is a wonderful family activity) assemble the boxes so that they have toys, candy, and toiletries and school supplies. We did that today. My family and some other families we know ran it for the morning session. Room One: Fill out a brief "About Me" form to put in the box. Room Two: Watch a short video about Operation Christmas Child and pick up a box. Room Three: Toiletries, such as toothpaste and toothbrushes, soap and washcloths. Rooms Four and Five: Toys, Miscellaneous, School supplies. Room Six: Prayer for your box. Room Seven: Drop-off.
My brothers and I were assigned to different rooms to help with this. I was in room six, which meant that when families and/or groups came in, the other three volunteers in the room and I would pray with them for the boxes and for the children who would be assigning them. Then we would give them Operation Christmas Child bookmarks with a weekly prayer guide on the back to remind them to pray for their boxes. This meant that when talking to one of my friends this morning afterward, I told her, "I spent all morning praying for shoeboxes." She said, "Nice. Wait. WHAT?!" "I spent all morning praying for shoeboxes. Operation Christmas Child." Her response: "I knew some part of that sentence didn't sound right."

Randomness

At the beginning of the school year my youth group attended a back-to-school rally thing, and different people would get up and sing, punctuated by different people from different churches getting up to pray for different things. There were a few hundred high schoolers at this rally. Part of the way through, I feel a tap on my shoulder, look around and my youth pastor whispers, "Hey Lisa, want to pray on the stage?" Regardless of the fact that I said yes, I have this thing with praying aloud, it feels...kind of awkward...this is just me, I think.
So last night, at the 6:45 prayer meeting before youth group, our youth pastor said, "Hey, it just popped into my mind. Tonight's missions night and we're talking about summer trips. Do you want to talk about Compass?" So I wound up talking about Compass to the entire youth group. One of my friends now wants to go, and we're going to talk about this more.
Ah, last minute decisions.

This morning at church was a specific day of service, and people from youth group who wanted to participate could spend the night at church. Meaning, losing to our youth pastor at basketball and hockey for a couple hours and a midnight 7/11 run. Then, a couple of my friends and I wound up in the youth room by ourselves, with Ben and Jerry's ice cream in our bloodstream, and we talked and drew on each other with green Sharpies until 2:30 in the morning.

Two things to say right now:

Happy Veterans Day! (Thank a veteran, or a soldier...)

Happy 11:11 on 11/11! (Just think how much fun we'll have NEXT year...)

Culture shock

I looked around at society as a whole differently that usual a few weeks ago, when my youth group pointed out the hole made by rejection of God. I started actually paying attention, and now it's everywhere. People are attempting to fill the hole with romance (marital or otherwise), money (which often equals success for many), education, or "higher causes" such as environmentalism, etc. Fame is in there, change is in there, etc. etc.
And I thought, "Wow. I have even more problems with and separation from this society than I already knew."
It's seriously weird to have culture shock about a culture I've lived in my whole life, but hey, that's the way it works.

Frankly, that was unexpected...

A new club just launched itself at college. It's called "Humanists, Skeptics and Freethinkers," otherwise known as the Secular Club, with the mission of exploring and promoting secular beliefs and values. All very well and good, perhaps, giving people the ability to look at that side of the spectrum, etc. That's fine.
Their first move was to invite the Christian Club to a debate.
They swiftly toned it down to a less confrontational panel. It would be moderated by the Contemporary Affairs Club, the largest group on campus. The way this event would work is, the moderator would pose questions about beliefs and values, etc., and each group would answer. The moderation of the Contemporary Affairs Club would mean that we (the SC and the CC) would get to steal their audience, which is good, because as the president of the new Secular Club said, "Their group is bigger than both of ours put together."
And, of course, the Christian Club wants to make a panel that will do the best as possible. So their first decision on who to be on the panel was the member with the most experience doing apologetics for them. Three guesses who that was.
This is probably going to be the biggest event I've ever done for the Christian Club. At the panel we did last March, there were only interested independents coming, and we still had a full house. At this event, there will in all likelihood be people affiliated with the Contemporary Affairs Club (a very large group), people affiliated with or supportive of the Secular or Christian Clubs, AND interested independents.
This is incredible. How many sixteen-year-olds get to do this sort of stuff? It's amazing that God can even use a minor on a college campus, among other things. Now, the question is, how is this going to work, and when?

Time pressure

The report I've been working on for geography now suddenly has more pressure, as it is due in December. That was way off in the future at the beginning of the semester. Now it's next month.

Shakespearean Scene Night, with my scene as Juliet :P with a couple huge soliloquys, is in January, suddenly less than two months away.

And with that, the departure of my older brother, the most amazing brother EVER, for boot camp, is also in January. January 10th, to be precise. (Which kinda makes 2010 seem like the end of the world.) That's five days before his 18th birthday. We don't even get to see him come of age.

2010 feels like it's getting old. So much happened and is happening this year - my brother's enlisting, my stint as club president and panel presenter, Compass, 16th birthday, Drummers Call, learning to play the guitar, etc. I'm such an idiot that I actually get attached to years. (Go ahead, call me a fail.)

On a more irritating, less dopey, societally failing topic, Santa Claus has begun to appear in malls. Already. I mean, seriously, they couldn't wait for Thanksgiving to be over? That used to be the cutoff... It's so commercialized! I'm almost jealous of the Jews and Muslims, because their celebrations haven't been jumped on and commercialized beyond recognition by secular society. Yom Kippur and Ramadan, among numerous others, have retained their original meaning, while Christmas (which is probably nowhere near the time when Christ was actually born) is known for Santa Claus (the only time of the year, I've heard, when people sit around a dead tree and eat out of their socks) and Easter is known for the happy bunny who gives away egg-shaped pieces of chocolate (how the HECK did eggs and bunnies get connected? I mean, come on!).

It's a seasonal annoyance. Ah, the season of goodwill, football, frantic shopping for Thanksgiving dinner and Christmas presents, and romanticized commercialism.

And the holiday season is underway...

Halloween is over. Next up we have Thanksgiving, then children of many belief systems and worldviews are going to start waiting for Christmas - not as Christ's birthday (which probably wasn't in December anyway) but as Santa Claus Day, with gifts and toys and candy.
It's a specific "holiday" right now, however. November second. Not a religious, pseudo-religious or ethnic holiday, but...election day. (Some of my very lucky friends have Election Day off from school.) My friends who are 18+, my parents and people across the country have marched off to vote (except for The Friz, whose application apparently didn't go through). My geography professor, a self-proclaimed politics junkie, is having a contest to see who can guess that party makeup of the House and Senate after the election. Everyone is getting excited about California Proposition 19, even people on the East Coast.
And someone attends an anti-Tea Party rally on the thirtieth of Oct. and brings a sign that says "Obama = Keynsian?" A Keynsian is someone who follows the policies of 20th century British economist John Maynard Keynes. NOT a Kenyan. The stimulus bill was a classic example of Keynsian economics. And this person also brought a video camera.



I especially enjoyed the woman getting all worked up about these insidious liars who would dare suggest such a thing.

Midterm

One of the questions on my psychology midterm today:

"The rise in ice cream consumption has corresponded with a rise in aggravated assault. A politician argues that ice cream should be banned to reduce the number of aggravated assaults. Besides needing to be voted out of office, this politician needs to understand _____________."